ChainThink report, March 22: According to The Block, Bitcoin mining difficulty adjusted downward by 7.76% to 133.79 T at block height 941,472 (March 21). The network's recent seven-day average hash rate now stands at 937.76 EH/s—the second-largest decline of the year, behind only the 11.16% drop on February 7.

JPMorgan analysts estimated in February that Bitcoin mining costs had fallen from $90,000 to $77,000 per coin as high-cost operators exited the market, yet remain above spot price levels. This difficulty reduction reflects not only cyclical price pressures but also structural shifts. An increasing number of publicly listed mining firms are transitioning infrastructure from Bitcoin mining toward AI compute operations. Core Scientific stated it expects to divest most of its Bitcoin treasury holdings by 2026 to fund expansion into AI and high-performance computing; Bitdeer liquidated its entire Bitcoin reserve to zero in February, and as of its March 21 weekly report, its Bitcoin holdings remain at zero. Companies including Cango, Riot Platforms, TeraWulf, IREN, CleanSpark, and Bitfarms have all recently adopted similar diversification strategies over the past several quarters.